Books I’m Not Recommending for Christmas: Faith and Non-Fiction

I noted yesterday how much British writing I’ve been reading. Interestingly enough, all of the works I’ve selected for the “not recommended list” are by American authors. But seven of the 12 listed under non-fiction are British, with two of those seven books being about Charles Dickens.

I’ve been thinking about (but not yet decided) about reading and writing about Dickens life and works next year. I’ve read quite a few of his novels, but by no means all of them. In September and October, when we spent four weeks in London, I took one morning and visited the Charles Dickens Museum at 48 Doughty Street, the place where he wrote The Pickwick Papers, Nicholas Nickleby and Oliver Twist. It was my second visit, and for whatever reason I find the building and its rooms, furnished much like they would have been in 1837-1839 when he and his family lived there, to be inspirational. We’ll see if I follow through on the plan.

This concludes my “books I’m not recommending for Christmas” for this year.

Faith

Plus or Minus: Keeping Your Life, Faith and Love Together Through Infertility by Matt and Cheri Appling.

So Many Christians, So Few Lions: Is There Christianophobia in the United States by George Yancey and David Williamson.

On Becoming Generative: An Introduction to Culture Care by Makoto Fujimura.

Pray, Write, Grow: Cultivating Prayer and Writing Together, First Draft Father: A Write-from-Home Dad Finds the Joy/Anxiety/Exhaustion/Wonder of Parenting and Write Without Crushing Your Soul: Sustainable Publishing and Freelancing by Ed Cyzewski.

The Soroti Project: A Heart-Filled and Heartless Story in Uganda by Joanne Norton.

 Coming Clean: A Story of Faith by Seth Haines.

Every Little Thing: Making a World of Difference Right Where You Are by Deidra Riggs.

Behold the Beauty: An Invitation to Bible Reading by Monica Sharman.

Love Expressed by Tristan Sherwin.

Non-Fiction

Christian Horror: On the Compatibility of a Biblical Worldview and the Horror Genre by Mike Duran.

Coming Out Christian in the Roman World: How the Followers of Jesus Made a Place in Caesar’s Empire by Douglas Boin. 

The First World War Galleries by Paul Cornish.

J.M.W. Turner: Painting Set Free edited by David Blayney Brown, Amy Concannon and Sam Smiles.

Rich Mullins: A Devotional Biography: An Arrow Pointing to Heaven by James Bryant Smith.

Road to Valor: A True Story of World War II Italy, the Nazis, and the Cyclist Who Inspired a Nation by Aili and Andres McConnon.

London Under by Peter Ackroyd.

Our Only World: Ten Essays by Wendell Berry.

Digging for Richard III: The Search for the Lost King by Mike Pitts.

The Great Charles Dickens Scandal by Michael Slater.

A Guide to Dickens’ London by Daniel Tyler.

On Glasgow and Edinburgh by Robert Crawford.

Illustration: Drawing of Charles Dickens at his writing desk at Gad’s Hill in Kent, his last home.